Re: Sound effects

["Iain *" <iaingnome gmail com>]

On Fri, Dec 12, 2008 at 8:18 AM, Patryk Zawadzki <patrys pld-linux org> wrote:
>
> Please remember that sounds are also a means of providing feedback to
> impaired users.

I knew someone would bring this up, and I actually meant to mention it
in the original mail but it was late and I was tired (etc)

I actually totally disagree. Not because i dont think impaired users
are not important
but because they are a very special case who's needs are met by other
technologies
such as screen readers and screen magnifiers
much better than by sound themes and 125 arbitrary sound effects.

This brings up another point that I forgot. The actual difficulty of
initially working out what a sound means.
Because the sounds are arbitrary there is no expectation[1] on the
part of the user that a certain action should create a sound
Which means that whenever a user hears a sound they need to try to
work out what it means. Was that swish new email or
CD burning finished? The user closes the laptop lid and hears
"lid-close" sound, thinks "what was that sound?" and opens the laptop
to check.

iain
[1] This is what the positive sound concept is trying to solve